The housing market is lower down on the political agenda than, say, the NHS or education, but issues such as the shortage of new homes, the inability of first-time buyers to get on the ladder and the length of social housing waiting lists are key vote winners — or losers. John Healey last week replaced Margaret Beckett as Housing Minister. Here is how the policies he has inherited stack up compared with the Opposition:

New homes The Government’s target of three million new homes by 2020 remains unchanged; it has ring-fenced £400 million to restart stalled construction projects. But the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats want to scrap centralised targets, with the former proposing financial incentives for local authorities who help to create new homes. The Liberal Democrats want to create community land trusts to make vacant public sector land available for 100,000 new affordable homes.

Garden-grabbing The Government says that local authorities can already veto developments that they consider “inappropriate” but recently launched a review to establish the level of the problem. The Tories and the Liberal Democrats want to redefine gardens as greenfield land to prevent them being developed.

Home information packs The Government introduced home information packs (Hips) in 2007 with the aim of protecting buyers and preventing sales from collapsing. Since April, Hips must be available as soon as a property is marketed. The Government says that Hips are here to stay, despite criticism that they slow down sales by increasing the cost of offering your home for sale. Both the Tories and Liberal Democrats want to scrap Hips but retain energy performance certificates, which are included in Hips.

Stamp duty Alistair Darling has extended the 12-month stamp duty exemption on homes costing under £175,001 until December. Critics say that this is still too low a figure to help most first-time buyers (in London, the average property price is £302,411) but the Government says it has no plans to raise the threshold. The Tories want to scrap stamp duty on homes costing up to £250,000; the Liberal Democrats say that the system needs reform but do not yet have an alternative.

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